reports from diverse sources seem to indicate NS is having major problems on the northern tier CLE - Chicago. Man freights reported dying on the law. As well Lakeshore limited and Capitol Limited trains taking major hits. Was especially bad South bend - CHI but also too delays to from Cleveland.
Anyone know how soon the transferred crews will be available for service ? These delays appear to be worse than the past BNSF delays. The NS delays are actually occurring in a much shorter distance than the BNSF’s delays ?
My employer is at MP 483 (just west of the Porter junction) and today there was an EB tied down in the Porter remote siding, an EB on track 1 which wasnt moving and a WB east of town. Three trains, no motion.
Got a feeling Blue Streak that you are correct…something is happening.
Looks like trains started piling up yesterday, but looks pretty good right now. Things have been tight between Chicago and Pittsburgh for month now. Somehow, have managed to work out of some pretty bad looking situations fairly quickly. No meltdowns, just singed around the edges, so far.
Dispatcher just started moving some re-crews the past hour or so. Heard some crews discussing the current events…sounds like there are quite a few trains that are parked.
AAR reported weekly carloads up 5% and intermodal up 6%+. We may wonder if this is concentrated on NS’ tier ? Just a 5% increase on the route would be taxing but suppose the traffic on the route is up 15 - 20% or more and other routes somewhat less than 5% ?
As of last evening, on Dearborn, there were a couple parked for crew and several parked waiting for a slot to get through Chicago to a foreign connection. Not great, but not terrible,either.
We tend to forget there is a massive amount of work between Porter and Chicago on the line. All traffic thru CP 485 must slow to 25 mph. That creates issues.
When all the Amtrak related work is completed, this should be a pretty efficient piece of railroad.
The problem of backups between Chicago & Pittsburgh has worked to my benefit in that I have been able to catch Amtrak’s “Capitol Limited” twice in the last 4 or 5 weeks. Both times on a late Sunday morning. It usuall rolls thru Pittsburgh very early in the morning. These have been the only time I’ve actually seen the bi-level & dome cars here.
It is likely that M/W work is the cause of the delays. Camp cars have been parked near 47th Street for the last week or so and a welded rail train was held in Canal Street for a day or two and was tying up the main yesterday.
Does anyone know how long these long delays might last? I’m scheduled on the CapitolLimited eastbound during mid-October. If #30 is going to be way late I’ll cancel my reservation and fly. Any advice?
In the past I found that summer construction delays were largely over by mid-October; what about this year? Any predictions?
As NS stock holders we may be more concerned than as an Amtrak supporter. The canary in the traffic delay mine is the delays to Amtrak. Chicago - Cleveland delays to Amtrak are approaching 5+ hours in both directions. That causes wonder as to what is happening to NS freight.
Some factors out of NS’s control may be weather and the ability of western RRs to accept their trains. We certainly do not want the STB to get involved and force various bad ideas on NS due to shipper complaints ?
If western RRs are being affected maybe they can loan some construction crews to NS so it can speed up infrastructure improvements ?
amtrak was late today as well.The local in Bryan is having problems getting our stuff to us in Archbold. Ns has parked trains in a siding for days at a time.The dispatcher was asking a train to pick up crews and bring them to Elkhart…There were 5 trains stopped on track 1 between Butler Indiana and Bryan Ohio.Ns is doing signal replacement and other Mow work as well in the area.
Posts here and elsewhere seem to point that not just one item is causing the problem. Questions for those in the know ?
Are the parked trains mostly west bounds ? If so
a. Is NS able to move freights east ward ?
b. Are crews able to move freights east ?
c. Is the freight yard north of Englewood unable to take trains due to yard construction or is the construction complete ?
d. Is the Englewood flyover construction still causing delays ?
e. Unconfirmed reports on other sites say some revenue METRA trains are sometimes using one track over the flyover ? If so that might stop traffic below for testing and observation ? Anyone ?
f. Are the at grade diamonds going to stay in place for alternate routings or are they going to be removed ?
What happens to the west bound crews that die on the law ?
are UP, BNSF, and others RRs unable to accept some thru trains ?
If #3 why has NS not implemented some kind flow control to keep from jamming up the route ? The FAA does it all the time. It certainly happened with the fire at Chicago center the other day. Realize that some NS locations would quickly jam up due to lack of space ?
What long term and short term solutions has / will NS implement to mitigate the problem ?
Has NS considered asking Amtrak to combine the west bound LSL and Capitol at Toledo / Cleveland when they arrive close to the same time ? Some reports have both trains running on markers of each other?. This in exchange of more priority.
As well maybe combine either to a Michigan train at Porter ? Or two separate Michigan routes combine ?
East bound at Chicago not so easy unless departures a
It’s nice to know that UPS can raise a fuss about their delayed trains and shipments. Unfortunately for Amtrak, when I cancel my eastbound reservation out of Cleveland in order to fly, instead, they have no leverage with NS; after all, we’re told, they’re lucky to be allowed to use those tracks at all.
If one checks out the arrival stats for 29 & 30 and 48 & 49 it’s obvious the problems are on NS exclusively west of Cleveland.
It’s bad enough to have to drive in the middle of the night to Cleveland for a 1:45 AM departure, but to think the train won’t arrive until 10:45 AM because of NS construction work is just awful. Yesterday’s 48 arrived at Penn Station at one minute before midnight, something which ought to be disallowed under the Geneva Convention. What if you were making a connection in New York, or Washington, for that matter? How long before Amtrak permanently loses these passengers?
I thank my brother rail fans here for getting to the real reason for the abysmal arrival times in Cleveland. Now I can fly, arrive in NYC at the same hour #48 is supposed to, and not have to sit in a torture chair for 8 or 9 hours at the station waiting…waiting…waiting…
A question for ACY: When trains that are not supposed to serve dinner (48 & 30), what do you do for passengers when the train is running 5 or 7 or 9 hours late? Since it’s an every night occurrence, is anyone planning for that and stocking the diner accordingly? Why not?